Girls Versus Suits
Recap Future Ted again expounds on the unknowable nature of destiny, and tells the kids about the time he almost met their Mother. After leaving class, he intercepts a series of frat boys inviting a woman (Cindy) up to the roof to drink. Confiscating the alcohol, he sits down to drink the beer with Cindy, a PhD student roughly his own age to whom he can relate. He asks her out on a date and when he comes to pick her up at her apartment, it turns out Cindy has serious issues with her roommate (who Future Ted reveals to be the Mother ); her dates keep falling in love with her roommate, and her roommate's strange habits annoy Cindy. Ted promises Cindy to never fall in love with her roommate - something to which future Ted says, "oops." During the date, Cindy explains more about her roommate's strange habits which she dislikes but Ted secretly thinks are awesome. Cindy tells how the Mother paints pictures of robots playing sports and has breakfast foods singing show tunes. Future Ted reveals the painting of robots playing volleyball is still hanging in the den and that an English muffin singing "Memories" is the most hauntingly beautiful thing he has heard to this day. Even though she complains about her roommate throughout the evening, Ted wants to continue dating Cindy. After the date, Cindy tells Ted she can't see him again, blaming the University policy preventing students and lecturers from fraternizing, as she fears it could cost her her scholarship. At first Ted tries to rationalize her decision as being for the best, especially as the others point out that Cindy's future and Ted's job are in jeopardy. Ted is inspired to try again, and shows up at Cindy's apartment and tries to persuade her to go out with him again, unwilling to miss out on the chance of her being the right woman. She takes Ted to talk in her room as her roommate is just about to leave the shower. As he tries to convince Cindy that their paths are meant to cross, he picks out items from her room which show how much they have in common. Cindy reveals that all three objects (the bass guitar, the Unicorns - 'Who will cut our hair when we are gone? ' album and World's End by T.C. Boyle ) are really connected to her roommate. Frustrated that Ted is already more compatible with her roommate, Cindy tells him to leave. Ted does not meet her roommate, although on his way out he does catch a glimpse of her foot, as she disappears into her bedroom. Ted forgets to take the yellow umbrella he brought with him, revealing how the Mother gets it back. MacLaren's has hired a hot female bartender, Karina, and Barney seeks to add her occupation to his list of conquests. But she doesn't like men in suits, having dated insensitive Wall Street losers. Barney is forced to choose between the girl and the suits. For a while he attempts to dress casually, convincing the hot bartender she misjudged him. He even sneaks away to the bathroom to wear his suit, where he accidentally rips the back. The suit is damaged beyond repair, but his tailor transplants the buttons to save another suit and Barney cremates the remains. Meanwhile, Lily, Marshall, and Robin argue about the bartender's hotness. Robin is jealous, and even gets behind the bar to show how the location amplifies natural beauty. Carl soon kicks her out from behind the bar. Marshall insists that the bartender is not that hot, saying that Lily is the most beautiful woman he has ever met. Lily tries to get Marshall to say that she is not as beautiful as the bartender, and eventually even implies that the bartender is hotter than Marshall, actually upsetting him a little. With the urn of suit ashes and his real tears for his lost suit, Barney convinces the hot bartender to go home with him. In his apartment Karina accidentally opens his closet full of suits and realizes he deceived her. She forces him to choose between her and his suits. The scene then transitions to a fantasy sequence, during which she is shown angrily leaving the building while Barney breaks into "Nothing Suits Me Like a Suit", professing his love of suits. He explains how he couldn't possibly choose one women over his suits that give him so much. He fires beams of magic at people on the street, transforming everyone so that they too are wearing suits. They and the rest of the cast all join in as the song grows to a big Broadway song-and-dance number. The sequence ends and we return to the moment where she gave him the ultimatum, where this time he admits his doubts to himself, saying she is "pretty hot." He tells her she is more important than the suits and they will go first thing in the morning. As they fall into bed, he turns to his suits and whispers, "you guys are fine." Continuity *Ted's love of bass-playing women, referenced in , , and , is referenced again when he finds his future wife's bass guitar. *Lily again reveals her bisexual tendencies when praising Karina's beauty. *The list of occupations of girls that Barney has banged was first referenced in . *The Mother makes her fourth on-screen appearance, albeit only her ankle is seen. She previously appeared, obscured by the yellow umbrella, in and , and in , obscured by a bridal veil. *Ted leaves the yellow umbrella behind in Cindy's apartment. Future Ted explains that this is how the mother got her umbrella back after losing it in . *When Ted makes fun of Robin for getting jealous that she may no longer be the "hottest girl in the bar" with Karina around, she giggles and claims that she isn't, referencing her inability to lie without laughing, first demonstrated in . *Ted mistakenly walked into Econ 305, thinking it was Architecture 101, in . *Barney being overly emotionally attached to his clothes previously manifested in . Future References (Contains Spoilers) *In Definitions, Future Ted says he wouldn't have met the Mother if he hadn't started teaching at Columbia, because it is where he meets Cindy, through whom the Mother and her band get hired to play at Barney and Robin's wedding, as seen in , where Ted finally meets her, as seen in . *Ted tells Cindy that he teaches drunk all the time despite university policy forbidding it. He is seen doing this in . *Barney continues to use the jar of suit ashes to pick up women, as in , he tells Robin that he had, on different occasions, claimed it was his trophy from Wimbledon and his parents' funeral urn, even once convincing a girl it was both. *Barney's strange fixation with his clothes is referenced again in . *Tim Gunn is referred to as Barney's personal tailor when he appears as a guest at his wedding throughout Season 9, as seen in , , and . *In , the Mother is seen with a painting of robots bowling, making an English muffin sing a breakfast-themed version of "One" from , and reading her copy of by , which Ted finds in Cindy's room. *The flashback to January 2010 in How Your Mother Met Me recounts the conversation between Cindy and the Mother after Cindy kicked Ted out of the apartment, revealing that she kissed the Mother and realized she might be gay, as revealed in . *Another song-and-dance number occurs in . Gallery Girls v suits - always in a suit.png|Never not in a suit Girls v suits - circumstancial hotness.png|Circumstantial hotness Girls v suits - barney misses suits.png|Barney misses suits Nothing suits me like a suit - gang.png|The gang suits up in Barney's mind Themothersfeet.jpg|Ted catches his first glimpse of The Mother Himym123.jpg Memorable Quotes Notes and Trivia Goofs and Errors *Barney claims not to have slept with a hot bartender before, however in he slept with Wendy the Waitress, who has been seen bartending on occasion but is only considered a waitress (as it says in her name). Technically, this would not be a mistake if Barney does not consider Wendy to be "hot", but considering how they were attracted to one another and slept together in The Platinum Rule, this is unlikely. Neil Patrick Harris even believed that line was "a bit of a lie" by the writers. http://au.tv.ign.com/articles/104/1046750p1.html Although, it should be noted that since when has Barney needed a legitimate reason to sleep with a hot girl. It is likely that his claims were just like any other overly-dramatic reasons he gave for sleeping with someone. *Marshall was rewarded with five slaps that he could give to Barney in . When Barney is being intimate with Marshall's suit, Marshall redeems one of his slaps so to speak. This could be considered the 5th and final slap, but in Slap Bet Marshall explains that one must slap the other as hard as he can. Still it could be considered as the 5th slap since you always could claim you could slap harder. *During Nothing Suits Me Like a Suit near the end, during the dancing, Ted lags behind slightly in the dancing just after they wave to the deceased suit. Allusions and Outside References *When Barney tells that the suit would "go out in a bang", it might references the Cowboy Bebop's protagonist, Spike Spiegel, which "bang" is his catchphrase. Also, Spike is always seen wearing a suit, similar to Barney. * The CD belonging to Cindy's roommate that Ted picks up when he is in Cindy's room is by . The book he picks up next is by . *When Barney mentions the professions of the girls he had sex with, the part "...A butcher, a baker, a candlestickmaker..." ''refers to the popular nursery rhyme ''Rub-a-dub-dub. *Ted works for . Cindy tells him that University policy prevents them from dating. According to Columbia University: "Consensual, romantic relationships between faculty and other employees and students and between individuals who work together are generally not considered sexual harassment and are not prohibited by University policy."http://www.columbia.edu/cu/gsas/sub/policies/grievance/harassment/ *When Barney abandons wearing suits, he wears a t-shirt that has the image of the cover of the 1924 book Die neue Wohnung by the famous architect . *The suits speaking to Barney when he is taking out a t-shirt for that night is like the Basilisk talking to Harry Potter in Parseltongue in . *The scene when Barney is in the bathroom stall putting on his suit references the scene in when Vincent Vega ( ) is injecting himself with heroin, underscored by the original music played over the scene being heavily influenced by the song "Bullwinkle Part II" by , however it is not the same song. *The scene when Barney sings and zaps people with a suit-ray resembles Neil Patrick Harris's character in . The cyan color of Barney's suit-ray also matches the color of Dr. Horrible's freeze-ray. *Ted describes the Mother's rendition of "Memories" as hauntingly beautiful. The song is " " from the musical . *When Ted asks out Cindy, her answer of "almost exclusively" is the same answer gets from a woman he asks out in the episode . Ted's question is "So, um, do you ever date cute idiots?" while Jerry's question was "So, um, do you date immature men?" * When Ted alludes to the future dogs he will have he names them, "Frank", "Lloyd", and "Wright". Forming the name, "Frank Lloyd Wright" the name of a famous american architect. Most likely the inspiration for the names.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Lloyd_Wright * The photo of Barney water skiing in his suit is reminiscent of when Fonzie went water skiing while still wearing his signature leather jacket in Happy Days. Music * - *Nothing Suits Me Like a Suit - Neil Patrick Harris Other Notes *By examining the ties and suits the main cast are wearing, you can see that the background photos for this website were shot on the same day as the dance sequence at the end of the episode. * This marks the 100th episode of the series. *"Nothing Suits Me Like a Suit" was backed by seventy-five dancersHow I Met Your Mother Behind the Scenes at YouTube. Retrieved November 28, 2010 and accompanied by a fifty-piece orchestra. *International Airdates: Australia: April 22, 2010 on Channel 7; United Kingdom: August 12, 2010 on E4. *Karina's name is never mentioned on screen, but is revealed in the cast list. *During the taping for the musical, in the second to the last scene where the cast dances, they had to reshoot it several times because Jason Segel kept messing up. *In the DVD commentary, the cast mention how one of the dancers had worn sneakers because they forgot their dress shoes. This can be seen straight after when Ted, Marshall, Lilly and Robin sing their parts, and a female dancer comes into shot with the other dancers wearing white shoes. Guests * - Cindy * - Himself * - Karina *Joe Nieves - Carl MacLaren *Ryan Bailey - Herb *James Pumphrey - Frat Dude #1 *Christopher Scott - Dancer * - Beth Reception * Donna Bowman of rated the episode with a grade A, describing the 100th episode as one of the best the show has ever produced. She describes the episodes as appealing to fans in a way that doesn't exclude other viewers, noting the quality of the writing and editing, the voiceover being used to great effect, and advancing the storyline for all the characters. http://www.avclub.com/articles/girls-vs-suits,36971/ * Brian Zoromski of gave the episode 9.8 out of 10. http://au.tv.ign.com/articles/105/1059403p1.html * Cindy McLennan of rated the episode with a grade A. http://www.televisionwithoutpity.com/show/how_i_met_your_mother/girls_vs_suits_1.php * Nickolas Clague of gave the episode 9.2 out of 10. http://nytimes.com/ * The episode hit a season high with 9.82 million viewers and high overall ratings. * The St. Petersburg Comic Review gave this episode 9.5 out of 10 stars. "...Barney's after a hot bartender...but will he choose her or his suits?" References External Links * * * uk:Girls Versus Suits Category:Episodes Category:Season 5 Category:Who is the Mother?